Report Reveals Widespread Use of Smuggled Mercury in Amazon Gold Mining

Mercury affects primarily children, who may be born with severe disabilities and face learning difficulties for the rest of their lives.

August 16, 2024 by Mongabay

By Fernanda Wenzel

• Enforcement against illegal gold mines in the Brazilian Amazon ramped up in 2023, but the contamination from the mercury used in mining will likely be felt for generations to come.
  
  
• According to a report from Brazilian think tank the Escolhas Institute, up to 73% of all mercury used in Brazil’s gold mines is of unknown origin; the country’s environmental agency states practically all mines in Brazil use illegal mercury.
  
  
• Mercury affects primarily children, who may be born with severe disabilities and face learning difficulties for the rest of their lives.
  

The return in 2023 of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to Brazil’s presidency marked a significant setback for illegal gold mining in the Amazon. During Lula’s first year in office, the federal environmental agency, IBAMA, destroyed 600 dredgers used to churn up riverbeds in search of gold, and 150 backhoe loaders doing the same on riverbanks.

However, the impact of illegal gold mines reverberates for dozens of years after they close. It’s not just the forests and rivers that may never be the same again; the mercury used by the miners continues to impact future generations.

“If we simply stop mining today and let nature regenerate itself naturally, there are estimates that this mercury will remain circulating in the environment for 100 years,” Paulo Basta, who coordinates studies on mercury contamination at Fiocruz, Brazil’s leading federal health research center, told Mongabay.

Mercury is widely used in the so-called garimpos, wildcat mines that undergo simpler environmental requirements than large-scale commercial mining projects. It helps separate the gold from the ore by sticking to it and forming a little ball, and is later burned off to leave behind just the gold.

More:
https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/report-reveals-widespread-use-of-smuggled-mercury-in-amazon-gold-mining/